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May 20, 2020
Hello! Wait, is it not Friday tomorrow?
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Top News
Apple today made it easier to unlock your phone without FaceID given that so many people are wearing masks.
Luckin Coffee’s battered stock saw a renewed wave of selling, after Nasdaq said it planned to delist the onetime market darling that shocked investors with revelations of accounting fraud last month.
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Founder Collective Barrels Forward, Closing Its Fourth and Newest Fund with $85 Million
Founder Collective, a seed-stage fund formed 11 years ago in Cambridge, Ma., has closed its newest fund with $85 million.
Earlier today, we talked with the firm's general partners -- Eric Paley, David Frankel, Micah Rosenbloom -- to learn more about it. Among our first questions: whether the three are themselves the largest investors in the new vehicle, as was the case with the firm's third fund, which closed with $75 million in capital commitments four years ago. (The three have long prided themselves on their ability to tell founders who they take the firm's capital that they truly are taking the investors' money.)
We also talked exits, geography, and investing through the coronavirus, a time when a lot of personal investors are being more cautious with their dollars.
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Massive Fundings
Atea Pharma, a seven-year-old, Boston-based biotech focused on viral infections like COVID-19, has raised $215 million in Series D funding. Bain Capital Life Sciences led the round, joined by RA Capital Management, Perceptive Advisors, Rock Springs Capital, Adage Capital Management, T. Rowe Price, Redmile Group, Omega Funds, and earlier backers. FierceBiotech has more here.
BetterCloud, an 8.5-year-old, New York-based operations management platform that helps IT departments manage and secure the SaaS tools their company uses, has raised $75 million in Series F funding led by Warburg Pincus. Other investors in the round include Bain Capital Ventures, Accel, Greycroft, Flybridge Capital Partners, New Amsterdam Growth Capital, and e.ventures. TechCrunch has more here.
Coalition, a three-year-old, San Francisco-based startup that combines insurance and security tools to help businesses manage and mitigate cyber risk, has raised $90 million in a Series C round that was led by Valor Equity Partners and included participation from Greyhound Capital and Felicis Ventures. The startup's post-money valuation of $890 million is more than triple the value set at its last fundraise a year ago. TechCrunch has more here.
MasterClass, a seven-year-old, San Francisco-based online course company featuring instruction from experts in a wide variety of fields, has raised $100 million at an $800 million valuation. Fidelity led the round, joined by 01 Advisors, Owl Ventures, and earlier backers Atomico, IVP, NEA, and NextEquity Partners. TechCrunch has more here.
Omada Health, a nine-year-old, San Francisco-based company that sells virtual and in-person tools for managing chronic disease, has raised $57 million from Perceptive Advisors, and it used some of that money to buy a smaller digital health start-up called Physera, which specializes in virtual physical therapy. Approximately $30 million of the total sum was used for the acquisition, a person familiar with the deal tells CNBC. More here.
Rapid Micro Biosystems, a 14-year-old, Lowell, Ma.-based developer of microbial detection tech for biopharma manufacturing, has raised $120 million in funding led by Ally Bridge, with participation from Endeavour Vision, Bain Capital Life Sciences, and Longitude Capital. More here.
Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings
ARTMS, a seven-year-old, Vancouver-based company focused on diagnostic imaging isotopes, has raised $19 million in a Series A funding. Deerfield Management Company led the round, joined by GHS Fund among others. More here.
Confluera, a two-year-old, Palo Alto, Ca.-based automated cyberattack response startup, has raised $20 million in Series B funding led by Icon Ventures, with participation from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Microsoft Chairman John Thompson, and former Zscaler COO Lane Bess. More here.
Happeo, a three-year-old, Amsterdam-based employee communications platform, raised $12 million in Series A funding led by INKEF Capital. VentureBeat has more here.
NextProtein, a five-year-old, Paris, France-based maker of insect-based animal feed and fertilizer, has raised €10.2 million ($11 million) in Series A funding. Blue Oceans Partners led the round, joined by Telos Impact and RAISE Impact. More here.
Octant, a three-year-old, Emeryville, Ca.-based synthetic biology drug discovery company, has raised $30 million in Series A funding led by Andreessen Horowitz. Xconomy has more here.
PresenceLearning, an 11-year-old, New York-based provider of live online special education services for K-12 schools, has raised $27 million in Series D funding. Bain Capital Double Impact led the round, joined by Catalyst Investors, New Markets Venture Partners, and Catamount Ventures. More here.
Sound Agriculture, an eight-year-old, Emeryville, Ca.-based developer of a plant breeding product, has raised $22 million in Series C funding. S2G Ventures led the round, joined by Cultivian Sandbox, Fall Line Capital, Cavallo Ventures and Syngenta Ventures. AgFunderNews has more here.
Truework, a three-year-old, San Francisco-based consumer identity platform that provides a way for banks, apartment-rental agencies, and others to check the employment details of an applicant quickly and in a secure manner online, has raised $30 million in Series B funding. Activant Capital led the round, joined by earlier investors Sequoia Capital and Khosla Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.
Smaller Fundings
Brainbase, a four-year-old, L.A.-based rights management platform that’s helping Hollywood studios manage their cultural icons' intellectual property, has raised $8 million in a Series A funding. Bessemer Venture Partners led the round, joined by Rent-the-Runway co-founder Jenny Fleiss, among others. TechCrunch has more here.
Brytlyt, a seven-year-old. London-based company that sells data analytics and visualization software as a service, has raised $4 million in Series A funding from Amadeus Capital Partners and Finch Capital. EU Startups has more here.
Command E, a two-year-old, San Francisco-based unified desktop search tool that helps users quickly scour for files and data sources across nearly every app they use, has raised $4.3 million in seed funding from Bain Capital Ventures, Craft Ventures, Amplify Partners, Abstract Ventures, and Upside Partnership. TechCrunch has more here.
FireHydrant, a two-year-old, New York-based company whose disaster management tools aim to help companies manage incidents and recover more quickly when things go wrong with their services, has raised $8 million in Series A funding. Menlo Ventures led the round, joined by Work-Bench. TechCrunch has more here.
Kitch, a year-old, Lisbon, Portugal-based startup that's building so-called cloud kitchens, has raised €1 million in pre-seed funding. Seedcamp and Mustard Seed MAZE led the round, joined by Groupe Keys Asset Management. More here.
Robocorp, a year-old, Helsinki, Finland and (more newly) San Francisco-based open-source Robotic Process Automation platform, has raised $5.4 million in funding from its earlier investors Benchmark, Slow Ventures, and firstminute Capital. The three had provided $5.6 million in funding to the company in November. More here.
Strapi, a four-year-old, Paris- and San Francisco-based open-sourced content management system, has raised $10 million in Series A funding led by Index Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.
Syndio, a four-year-old, Seattle, Wa.-based employee compensation analysis platform, has raised $7.5 million in Series A funding. Voyager Capital and the Emerson Collective led the round. GeekWire has more here.
Tapcart, a three-year-old, Santa Monica, Ca.-based mobile commerce company, has raised $10 million in funding. SignalFire led the round, joined by Greycroft and Amplify Partners. Built in LA has more here.
Tava Health, a 10-month-old, Salt Lake City, Ut.-based mental tele-health platform for employers, has raised $3 million in seed funding led by Peterson Ventures. Deseret News has more here.
Xwing, a four-year-old, San Francisco-based startup at working a suite of technologies necessary for pilotless flight of small passenger aircraft, has raised $10 million in Series A funding led by R7 Partners, with participation from Thales, Alven, and Eniac Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.
No-One-Yet-Knows-How-Much Fundings
Tonal, a five-year-old, San Francisco-based connected fitness company whose $3,000 wall-mounted strength-training product uses electromagnetism to simulate and control weigh, is looking to raise funding that would value the company at $250 million or more, reports Bloomberg. Earlier backers include L Catterton, Mayfield, and Sapphire Ventures. Crunchbase shows the company has raised $90 million previously. More here.
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New Funds
Benchmark has closed its tenth venture fund with $425 million commitments, confirms a new SEC filing that was expected. Partners in the new fund include Peter Fenton, Chetan Puttagunta, Sarah Tavel and Eric Vishria. More here.
Lachy Groom, an early Stripe employee and an angel investor, is looking to raise around $100 million for his second venture fund, says the WSJ. According to a separate regulatory filing, he'd raised $48 million for his debut fund. More here.
Naples Technology Ventures, a two-year-old, Naples, Fla.-based early-stage venture firm, has raised over $30 million toward a planned $50 million for its new NTV Frontier Fund, according to the company. The firm plans to back companies focused on SaaS, artificial intelligence, blockchain, robotics, and other advanced technology sectors. Crunchbase News has more here.
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Exits
Another longtime retailer goes down. Victoria's Secret's parent company, L Brands, announced today that it will permanently close 250 stores in the U.S. and Canada in 2020. The news comes just weeks after L Brands confirmed that a deal to sell a majority stake in the company to the private-equity firm Sycamore Partners had fallen through. CNBC has more here.
Intel said today that it has acquired eight-year-old, Austin, Tex.-based Rivet Networks for undisclosed terms. Rivet's portfolio of ethernet controllers, wireless chips, and management software that will become part of Intel’s product lineup while Rivet becomes part of Intel's Wireless Solutions Group within Intel’s Client Computing Group. Rivet had raised at least $8.8 million from investors, per Crunchbase. PCWorld has more here.
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People
After the quarantine ends, Coinbase will be a remote-first company, CEO Brian Armstrong told staff today, meaning the majority of employees will have the option to work in an office or remotely.
Former Google exec Bill Maris has hired six new people for his bio and technology fund, dubbed Section 32. Many of them hail from his former employer, Google. One newcomer is Claire Stapleton, organizer of the Google walkout.
Ola said today that it is cutting 1,400 jobs in India, or 35% of its workforce in its home market, as the nearly 10-year-old, ride-hailing firm works to reduce its expenses to steer through the coronavirus pandemic that has severely impacted mobility companies in the country.
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Essential Reads
Rumors swirled today that Amazon is kicking the tires of J.C. Penney, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Friday. The 118-year-old department store chain owns 347 of its 846 locations and features a supply chain network with 11 facilities made up of fulfillment centers, store merchandise distribution centers, and regional warehouses, notes Bisnow. More here.
Discovery and Science Channel will share live coverage of the May 27 launch of SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket and Crew Dragon Capsule that will send astronauts into space from the U.S. for the first time since the Space Shuttle was retired in 2011.
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Detours
Health experts say schools can reopen in the fall, with changes.
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